Eamonn & Ruth
RUTH: ‘She loved him, but when she heard him chew, she fantasised about his death.’ Now, how many of you can identify with that?! Eamonn came across a range of greeting cards called Jeffrey and Janice’s funniest moments, on which that phrase was captioned – and posted it on his Instagram account. He thought it was a very apt description of me. You see, noise irritates me and Eamonn making noise irritates me even more! Eamonn eating, slurping, rustling, sneezing, yawning and even breathing, dare I say. He thinks I’m really odd. Well, it turns out that I’m not as odd as he thinks and if I am, I am certainly not alone – as we found out when we made this into an item on This Morning. It appears I, and lots of you, suffer from misophonia, which is an acute noise sensitivity.
EAMONN: Obviously it’s hard for Ruth and anyone else to live with but it’s also very hard for partners and families of sufferers. The great thing is that the Jeffrey and Janice cards have at last got us talking about it. Ruth and I have had many unnecessary fall-outs which we can now attribute to misophonia. Tempers can get frayed over what seems like completely unnecessary tetchiness or criticism. So I do my best to predict what is coming because
I knowwhy it is coming. I now forgo my cup of tea if it’s too hot, or my bowl of soup, if I think either will put Ruth on edge and disrupt the rest of the day.
RUTH: I have no idea if science will find a way to cope, but in the meantime, Eamonn and I have come to an understanding which wasn’t there before. It goes without saying, if you find a cure short of the death fantasy, please let me know!
Ruth: ‘Eamonn making noise irritates me’